Great article! I like how you put evidence to support your statement and I like the facts you put down too. Good article Enoch! I like how you put information or evidence to support your statement and I like the facts you put. If anyone puts him not in top 3 then they are disrespecting the greatest of all time! I really liked this article and what you did with it, I like the amount of facts you put into it. Keep up the hard work.
Good work! I really enjoyed how you put so many stats in there also with many facts, he was an amazing play. I really enjoyed this article! I agree there was nobody who could stop him. He scored when he wanted to or got an assist , and a rebound when he wanted. He is also the most athletic player ever. Great writing keep it up. Great article Enoch! You put a lot of time and research into your article.
Michael Jordan is the greatest to ever do it though. Great Job! I really enjoyed reading this article, as I knew a little about Wilt, but this really put his greatness into perspective. Great article, man , I look forward to reading more! I believe the best is Jordan but Wilt is still top 10 all time. Keep up the great writing. You did a great job researching and arguing your case for Wilt Chamberlain being the Greatest player of all time. In my opinion, LeBron James is the greatest player.
Great article though, keep up the great work. Your article was really good, and it sounds like you did a lot of research to prove yourself. But personally I do not think he was the best basketball player ever. In my opinion it would be like Kareem or Lebron. Really good article though keep up the good work. When people don even place him top 3 or even top 5 it is just disrespectful to the greatest of all time. Close Menu.
RSS Feed. Submit Search. The Learning Lessons of Tennis. Kings Beat Huskies Navigate Left. Navigate Right. Kings' Courier. Share on Facebook. But generally the numbers were spread around—there weren't individuals putting up the kind of numbers Chamberlain was producing. Going back to that ''62 season, Wilt averaged a league-leading The next best scorer was rookie Walt Bellamy at a much more human-looking The only other rebounder over 20 per game was Bill Russell at So notwithstanding that scoring and rebounding were both up compared to the modern era, The Stilt's numbers were practically in a category of their own.
This has less to do with the level of competition than it does with the fact that he was that much better than the competition. The way the argument tends to go is this: If you took Chamberlain and put him in the modern era, he'd be nothing special.
It presumes that the old era player would have the same training as he did back then, which is silly. You put Wilt Chamberlain into the modern game, with modern workout routines and modern strategies, and he will still be the best player on the floor on any given night.
As a game evolves, the level of competition tends toward the middle, with aberrations at both ends disappearing; the weakest players will get better and the gap between the good and the great will shrink, bringing the exceptional players back to the pack.
But it would still follow logically that a 21st century Wilt would be in the running for the scoring, rebounding lead and possibly assists titles each year. Being at the very top of the game is the mark of a great player, regardless of the competition. This is a popular accusation and one that holds no more water for Chamberlain than it does for any other great player.
Kobe Bryant has been in the top two in the NBA for field goals attempted eight times, including the last seven seasons in a row. Scorers shoot the ball. A lot. They want the ball and they want to take charge of the game offensively. That is precisely what makes a great scorer who he is. With the Philadelphia Warriors early in his career, Wilt was the man and expected to lead the scoring parade.
Paul Azin and Tom Gola could provide solid secondary scoring, but they weren't going to lead the charge. Wilt stepped up and shot the ball way more than those two players combined. But when he moved to the 76ers, the dynamic changed. Entering a system that was already pretty good, with very solid scoring options in Hal Greer, Chet Walker and Billy Cunningham, Wilt didn't have to do it all himself. He began to distribute the ball more and had seasons where he led the team with , and a league-leading assists, winning a championship along the way.
Now, you can call me crazy if you'd like, but from where I'm sitting, fundamentally changing your game in the prime of your career and earning a championship as a result is not how I define selfish play. Teams that Chamberlain played on won almost two thirds of the time. He went to the finals six times and earned two rings. One of those championships meant doing the undoable for the 60s—beating the Boston Celtics. Equally telling is that every team he moved to in his career got better when he arrived on the scene.
The Philadelphia Warriors went in the season for a. With the addition of Wilt for the ''60 season, the Warriors improved by 17 wins, to and instantly became a contender. Likewise, the lackluster Philadelphia 76ers went from in the ''64 season to an even. Then, they had a year in ''66 and were first place in the East with a full season of Chamberlain at center. Despite the fact that Chamberlain had reportedly stayed out all night the previous evening, he obviously came ready to play against the Knicks.
In , Chamberlain moved with the franchise to San Francisco, and he led the league in scoring in both and The Warriors lost to the Celtics in the Finals in five games. But midway through the following season, he was sent back home to Philadelphia. The Sixers were a. The following season, , Philadelphia posted the best record in the league, at , but for the second year in a row the 76ers fell to Boston in the Eastern Division Finals.
Philadelphia, which had added talented forward Billy Cunningham, started the year by winning 45 of its first 49 games en route to an record, at the time the best in league history. In the division semifinals, the Sixers ousted Cincinnati. The division finals saw the 76ers matched up against the Celtics — and Chamberlain matched up against Russell once again.
Playing the Warriors in the NBA Finals, the Sixers came away with the championship, winning the series in six games. During his first seven years Chamberlain scored an average of Was the waning production attributable to the effects of age and better defenses? I wonder sometimes if that was a mistake. One of the main reasons coaches asked him to shoot less was to try to win more.
In , Sixers coach Alex Hannum asked Chamberlain to pass the ball more often than shoot, and to play more aggressive defense. The strategy worked. Although he failed to win the NBA scoring title for the first time in his career, averaging Chamberlain took his new role so seriously that he led the league in assists the next season.
After taking the Eastern Division that season, the Sixers were eliminated in the conference finals for the third time in four seasons by the Celtics.
The most notable season was , in which he scored only But his contributions came in other forms. At age 35, he managed to grab Retiring from the NBA at the end of the season, Chamberlain went on to demonstrate the full range of his talents. Like many pro players, he spent a year coaching at the pro level, for the San Diego Conquistadors of the American Basketball Association. San Diego had wanted him to be a player-coach, but legal entanglements prevented that, and Chamberlain soon became bored with a coach-only role.
Big-league volleyball attracted his energies for a while, as did tennis, running marathons and even polo. At one point he hoped to challenge Muhammad Ali to a world heavyweight fight. Even when he was in his 50s, a story would pop up every now and then about some NBA team talking to Chamberlain about making a comeback, figuring he could still give them 15 or 20 solid minutes as a backup center.
Chamberlain, who loved the limelight, seemed to bask in those reports, but he never took up any team on its offer. You agree that your personal information will be used to send you messages about NBA related products and services, and share your personal information with NBA partners and affiliates so that they can also contact you about products and services that might be of interest to you. From NBA. September 13, September 14,
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